A Heritage Language Learner’s Literacy Practices In A .

A Heritage Language Learner’s Literacy Practices in a KoreanLanguage Course in a U.S. University: From a MultiliteraciesPerspectiveJayoung ChoiABSTRACT: Drawing on multiliteracies, the author examines how a multiliteracies curriculum in a 3rdyear Korean heritage language (HL) class at a southeastern U.S. university contributed to the developmentof a student’s HL literacy skills. Print-based and multimodal responses (i.e., a digital animation movie) tothe readings of students’ choices and language logs were aligned with the four components of amultiliteracies pedagogy (i.e., situated practice, overt instruction, critical framing, and transformativepractice). The qualitative data analysis suggests that a multiliteracies curriculum helped an HL learnerdevelop motivation to read in Korean, adopt an agentive take on Korean language learning, and form anemerging literate identity as a legitimate reader and writer in the HL. The author discusses importantimplications for reading/literacy educators in various contexts.Keywords: Korean, heritage language, multiliteracies, university-level language classroom, multimodalreading responseJayoung Choi is a clinical assistant professor of ESOL/Literacy education at Georgia State University.Her research interests include adolescent English and heritage language learners’ literacy practicesand identity development and multimodal literacies taken up and practiced by ELLs and ESOLteachers. Her work has been published in Foreign Language Annals, TESL Canada Journal, andJournal of Asian Pacific Communication. She can be reached at jayoungchoi@gsu.edu or 404-4138380.Journal of Language and Literacy Education Vol. 11 Issue 2—Fall 2015http://jolle.coe.uga.edu

Journal of Language and Literacy Education Vol. 11 Issue 2—Fall 2015Heritage language (HL) learners1 who areexposed to and speak a language other thanEnglish exclusively in their homes andcommunities exhibit relatively lower reading andwriting skills compared to their higher speaking andlistening abilities in their HL (Byon, 2008; Felix,2009; Jensen & Llosa, 2007; Kondo-Brown, 2010;Mikulski, 2010). The lower literacy competenciesexhibited by many HL learners is attributable to thepaucity of bilingual programs and to English-onlycurricula in U.S. schools, as this lack of availabilityleaves parents primarily responsible for maintainingand developing their children’s HL (Lee & Oxelson,2006; Olsen, 1997; Potowski & Carreira, 2004). Thelack of structured and sustainable programs for theHL learners in their formal schooling to develop allfour language domains is a true loss for the nationallinguistic and cultural asset. HL learners are deprivedof the opportunity to expand their linguisticrepertoire, to develop a more sophisticated anddeepened understanding about the HL history,culture, and community, and to construct a healthiercultural and ethnic identity (Lee & Wright, 2014).southeastern U.S. university contributed to thedevelopment of a student’s HL literacy skills. I firstturn to the theoretical framework of the study,multiliteracies, and pertinent literature on languagelearners’ literacy practices in the classroom contextsand literacy practices in HL classes.A Multiliteracies PedagogyNevertheless, it is a welcoming phenomenon that anincreasing number of HL learners have beenenrolling in foreign language classes in the UnitedStates hoping to improve their HL skills when theyenter universities (Byon, 2008; Sohn & Shin, 2007).However, whether or not the university languagecourses meet the literacy needs of HL learners hasnot yet been determined (Gambhir, 2008; Ilieva,2008; Jensen & Llosa, 2007; Jeon, 2010; Kondo-Brown,2010; Schwarzer & Petr on, 2005). For example,because in some cases low enrollments do notfinancially justify establishing separate HL and nonHL tracks (Gambhir, 2008) or because of a lack ofinstructor’s training on teaching HL learners(Potowski, & Carreira, 2004), many HL learners findthemselves unchallenged and frustrated in languageclassrooms. Hence, university language coursecurricula that address HL learners’ literacy needsplay a pivotal role in sustaining their interest in andenhancing of their knowledge about HL languageand culture.In developing a 3rd-year Korean HL course, I wentbeyond the traditional notion of literacy as a singleform of print-based reading and writing. I drew onthe theoretical concept, multiliteracies (the NewLondon Group, 1996), that takes into consideration“the multiplicity of communications channels andmedia, and the increasing saliency of cultural andlinguistic diversity” (p. 63) reflecting capes. Multiliteracies involves presentation rather than solely relying on thewritten or spoken language, which has been thedominant mode in school curriculum (Jewitt, 2008;Kress, 2000; the New London Group, 1996). Centralto multiliteracies is the notion of design, theintentionality in using resources for meaningconstruction. The design framework accentuateslearners’ agency and transformation in the process ofmeaning making by utilizing available semioticresources. As Kress (2000), one of the New LondonGroup (1996) scholars, posits, “The work of the textmaker is taken as transformative of the resources andof the maker of the text. It gives agency of a real kindto the text maker” (p. 340). In designing texts, theuse of multimodal resources is essential (Cope &Kalantzis, 2000):The increasing multiplicity and integration ofsignificant modes of meaning-making, wherethe textual is also related to the visual, theaudio, the spatial, the behavioural, and so onmeaning is made in ways that areincreasingly multimodal-- in which writtenlinguistic modes of meaning are part andparcel of visual, audio, and spatial patterns ofmeaning. (p. 5)In this article, I examine how a multiliteraciescurriculum in a 3rd-year Korean HL class at aWhen applied in the classroom, a multiliteraciespedagogy is comprised of four components: situated117

Choi, J. (2015) / A Heritage Language Learner’s Literacy Practicespractice, overt instruction, critical framing, andtransformative practice (the New London Group,1996). “Situated practice” is primarily concerned withimmersing learners in an authentic learningenvironment in which they engage in rich literacytasks by interacting with others and by drawing ontheir out-of-school interests and expertise.Nevertheless, the sociocultural view of literacy thatemphasizes practice through immersion does notoverlook ‘overt instruction’ to ensure that learnersdevelop metalinguistic skills for the ultimateimmersion learning experience (Vygotsky, 1986).After all, learners must be able “to gain consciousawareness and control of what they acquired” (theNew London Group, 1996, p. 85). In addition tosituated practice and overt instruction, amultiliteracies curriculum creates spaces for learnersto step away from what they know and have learnedand to examine their work critically (“criticalframing”) and to recreate their realities, identities,and discourses by challenging common practices anddiscourses (“transformative practice”; Kern, 2000).(Blattner & Fiori, 2011). The studies have collectivelyreported that a multiliteracies approach to languageteaching and learning helps develop students’linguistic competencies, agency, and learnercommunities.Research more pertinent to the current study tookplace in a university ESL reading course in Taiwan(Lee, 2013). After the class read classic literature inEnglish, the students created multimodal responsesinstead of expressing them in an exclusivelylinguistic format. The students’ work included skits,comic strips, and operatic music that representedtheir understanding of the text. The analyses ofvideotaped group presentations, peer evaluations,and open-ended surveys indicated that multimodalreading responses empowered language learnersoften limited by language abilities, helping them tocomprehend the text better. In a radio show, onegroup of students created a sequel to the literaturethat reflected their lived experiences with andknowledge of the traditional Taiwanese puppetshows. While creating the multimodal readingA Multiliteracies Pedagogy in Action inresponse, “they [the ESL students] created, entered,Language Classesand sustained the storyworld and transformed itIn this section, I exploreto make it fit their ownthe application of theworld”(p.197).theoreticalconcept,Importantly, Lee foundDesigning identities and text rgent literacy components ranginguniversity-level languagemultimodalreadingfrom unimodal literacy practices and skillsclassroom. A number ofresponses to the single textEnglish as a Secondseemed to enhance theinstruction to multimodal readingLanguage(ESL)andclass’s understanding ofresponses could importantly contribute toforeign language universitythe text collectively andexpanding the timely theoretical concept,classes have incorporatedmultimodallyreinforcedmultiliteracies into theirtheir understanding of thecurriculum.Intheseliterature. Lee documentedcourses,studentsthat in this process, thecomposed digital storiesstudents appeared to gainaboutpersonaltopicsconfidence as learners of(Alameen, 2011; Vinogradova, Linville, & Bickel, 2011),English and were more likely to sustain an interest increated digital videos for a science project in anreading in English. Lee’s study highlights thatEnglish as a foreign language setting (Hafner &languagelearnersgainedmorenuancedMiller, 2011), communicated with other globalunderstanding about reading contents wheninterlocutors by using video conferencing softwarepermittedtoexpresswhattheylearned(Guth & Helm, 2012), and searched and studiedmultimodally. In addition, the study suggests that agroups in Facebook in an intermediate Spanish classmultiliteracies pedagogy that builds on students’118